


As the blackbird sings

by duesternis



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Crying, Established Relationship, M/M, Men Crying, Reunions, Somebody Lives/Not Everyone Dies, going home as a theme, hugs and kisses, or well charles crying, the boys are gonna be alright, the walk out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-12
Updated: 2021-02-12
Packaged: 2021-03-12 06:48:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29380902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/duesternis/pseuds/duesternis
Summary: “Hello, Charles,” he said kindly and took Charles by the arms, hands squeezing Charles’ slops.“Hello Lieutenant,” said Charles by rote, blood rolling in his ears, stomach collapsing in on itself.
Relationships: Charles Frederick Des Voeux/James Fairholme
Comments: 4
Kudos: 5
Collections: The Terror Rarepair Week 2021





	As the blackbird sings

**Author's Note:**

> home turf for the rare pair week prompt "The walk out"
> 
> this is fic number 69 in the rare pair week collection. can i get a hell yeah, everybody

It was like a nightmare had turned itself around at the last second, back into a pleasant dream.  
At first he’d thought it a mirage, some kind of hallucination, due to the cold, the hunger, the ever-growing weakness set into their bones.  
There were men coming towards them.  
Many men, hauling, laughing, waving.

Charles knew the man in front better from his shape alone than he knew the back of his own hand.  
The purposeful stride, the contained swing of his strong arms, the mustache, frosted as it was.  
The Captains had the honor of shaking hands first, as the men all fell over each other, dispensing hugs and kisses and tossing their hats as if they had just discovered the damned, elusive Passage.  
Charles stood there, someone pounding his shoulder and laughing into his ear, and tried to smile at least.  
It didn’t work.  
His face was frozen.  
His limbs locked in ice, like the ships they had left behind.

Impossible to say how long he stood there like that, impromptu camp breaking out around him, until (finally, finally, _finally_ ) James stood there and looked at him.  
Somehow he had mantained a clean shave.  
Or the closest thing to it possible out here.

“Hello, Charles,” he said kindly and took Charles by the arms, hands squeezing Charles’ slops.  
“Hello Lieutenant,” said Charles by rote, blood rolling in his ears, stomach collapsing in on itself.

James smiled at him, a hint of desperation in his dark eyes.  
His mustache twitched and the hands on Charles’ arms flexed, thumbs digging into the many layers.  
“Rest, Mr Des Voeux, we’ve brought food and furs.”  
The hands started loosening their hold and Charles opened his mouth, a miserable sound spilling out.  
He grabbed the front of James’ slops and stepped closer, feet clumsy on the shale.  
James caught him, cradled him, tucked Charles’ head under his chin and held him tightly.

Charles felt like sobbing, like wailing, like crying his eyes out, he was so exhausted, he was so frustrated, he was so angry.  
He was so glad that James was safe and back with him.  
A deep inhale and Charles found a whiff of James’ cologne in the weave of his muffler. It made him sob.  
“It’s really you.”  
James rested his cheek on Charles’ head, a man walking past them, probably giving them a double-take at least, but Charles had his face pressed into James’ chest and didn’t care for anything else right now.  
“It’s really me, Charles. Truly, I swear it.”

Charles fisted James’ slops in both hands, sobbed into his muffler again, a third time, and then inhaled deeply, shuddering.  
Stepped out of the embrace and wiped his face down with his mittens.  
“Sorry, sir, I will help the men set up. You should rest, you did by far more walking than we all.”  
James’ hands slid off of Charles’ slops and he let him step away with a little nod.

Charles turned and found something to do with a pointer from Le Vesconte down by the cooking tent.  
The men from the fort and James had brought back supplies, food that did not come from a tin.  
It was mostly jerky, preserves in well-packed glass jars, the colours so vibrant and juicy that Charles’ mouth watered at the sight alone.  
Dimly he remembered that preserves were a pale image of the true fruits, but at this point it had been years.  
He couldn’t wait for the Captains to let them all have some fruit.

Outside someone broke into song.

It didn’t take long and the whole camp was singing as they set up the last tents.  
Captain Fitzjames had the spring in his step back that up to now Charles hadn’t even noticed missing.  
One of the men from the fort walked next to the Captain, talking to him with a half-smile. They ducked into the command tent and Charles caught a glimpse of James, rid of his slops and cutting as handsome a figure as ever in his dark coat.  
The tent flap fell closed and Charles aimlessly walked through camp, trying to find the sled with his personals.  
They all looked the same, boxes and tarps.  
“Morfin,” he said and the sailor lifted his shaggy head.  
“Sir?”  
“Happen to know where our sled is?”  
“Ah,” said Morfin, pulling on his overgrown beard a bit, eyes squinted against the light. “Over there, sir, where the Corporal stands.”  
Charles turned, followed the line of Morfin’s finger, finding Terror’s Corporal leaned against a sled, rolling his neck as if he had some kind of tension in it.  
“Thanks, carry on.”  
“Sir.” Morfin nodded and turned back to the little worn book in his gloved hand  
Charles left him to it, walking over to the sled.

His personals were settled in the far corner, where he had left them. Grunting he got them out, Terror’s Corporal watching with a mildly interested smile.  
“Your tent is over there, Mr Des Voeux,” he suddenly said, spooking Charles from the contemplation of his things.  
“Excuse me?”  
“Your tent.” With a kind smile the man pointed again and Charles nodded curtly, leaving for it.  
He really needed the rest James had told him to get, it seemed like.

The tent was deserted for now and Charles claimed a spot where the shale looked not quite as sharp. Unrolled his bed roll, the furs, his sack.  
He settled down on it, slops still on, boots crossed, hat pulled down over his eyes.  
And then Charles cried.  
Silently, like he had done back on the ships at night, James gone, the ice ever more crushing them and Captain Crozier doing nothing for them at all.  
Only that now James was back, the ice was still crushing the ships, but Charles tried not to think about that.  
Captain Crozier, he supposed, was doing his best.  
Charles still cried.  
Until he was exhausted to the bone and fell asleep.

James could barely comprehend having made it to the fort, then back, having actually found the crews walking already.  
Charles with them.  
Healthy as he could be, James guessed.  
Hoped.  
They hadn’t spoken much before James had been roped into the command tent, Charles somewhere in camp – closer than he had been for a very long time, but still so far away.  
And by the time James stumbled out of the meeting, dinner was served, and Le Vesconte convinced James to bunk with him.  
Henry seemed overjoyed to have another Lieutenant to share the burden of Erebus’ crew with again.  
James didn’t have it in him to deny him the comfort.

And before he knew it he was settled for a night of undisturbed sleep next to Henry, the shale digging into his back.  
James turned to face the wall of the tent, wind making it whisper slightly.  
Charles was in camp with him, turned on his right side, probably, eyes closed and dreams hopefully pleasant.  
He prayed for it, as he had done every night since he’d walked towards their salvation.

The next time he opened his eyes it was morning.  
It wasn’t easy to get out of bed, frozen stiff as he was, but it was needed, so James did it.  
Henry still slept, brow creased in his dreams.  
James nudged him in what could be an accidental fashion, jostling him awake.  
“Oh, Henry, pardon me, I did not mean to wake you.”  
Henry made a throaty sound, stretched in his sack, shivered and sat up.  
“No, it’s fine.”  
They shared a smile and then Henry rose, dressed with a little curse, dragged his fingers through his hair and was out of the tent.  
No comb, no hair oil, not even a wash.  
Well, not that James was doing any of that.  
How far from home they had come.

Outside it was even colder than in the tent, the pale sun in the sky mocking the shivering men.  
Camp was already busy, men with jobs walking briskly to and fro, the others milling around the stove, ready for their breakfast.  
Charles was among them, chuckling a bit with a group of men James couldn’t recognize under all their layers, hair and beards overlong.  
James licked his mustache out of habit, closed his coat over his chest and that caught Charles’ eye.  
His expression didn’t change, but there was a glow on his skin that made James smile.  
His darling boy, his happy boy.  
Charles excused himself from the conversation and crossed the square of the camp with big steps.

“James,” he said, coming to a stop next to James, their arms touching.  
“Charles, did you sleep well?”  
Discreetly James turned his hand, so that Charles’ fingers slid against his palm. Cold and rough with it, but undeniably Charles’ fingers.  
He hadn’t fully thought he’d ever feel them on his skin again.  
“I slept. You?”  
“Dreamt of you, but I always do.”  
Charles laughed, cheeks red, but that could be the cold too. It and the wind whipped them all into a perpetual blush.  
They took a step back as one, when three of the men came by, carrying a large crate between them.  
It meant they stood between two tents now, shielded from wind and scrutiny alike for a breath.

Charles turned his face into the side of James’ chest, one arm loose around James’ waist, ready to slip away, if someone came close.  
“James,” he said, and James cupped the back of Charles’ head in his hand.  
Pressed a short kiss to his greasy, stringy hair and Charles let go of him again.  
“Breakfast, sir?”  
“I could use some food, yes.”  
Hartnell stepped out from the tent across from them and nodded, passing them.  
James idly wondered if he had seen them, heard them maybe, and had decided to stay inside a bit longer, to give them privacy.  
Wondered what he had missed of the crews since walking out.

“Come on,” Charles said softly, tossing half a smirk over his shoulder and James followed him easily to the queue for breakfast.  
Standing behind him James had a good vantage point to come to the conclusion that the back of Charles’ neck was in need of a thorough wash.  
Which probably meant the rest of him was just as filthy.  
Not that James blamed any man who went for only a cursory wipe down in these climes.  
But he would love to give Charles a little sponge-bath.  
Maybe at the fort, where they could get warm water and some privacy, even if it was only behind a hung sheet.

They ate their breakfast – some kind of porridge and a ship’s biscuit each – standing up and then James squeezed Charles’ shoulder and they each went to attend their respective duties.  
It was odd to be back in his Lieutenant boots fully, with the crew in all its ramshackle glory to look after, and not be on a ship.  
James missed the swell and rock of the ocean, the smell of salt in the air.

Walking chased Charles out of his own body. Out of his own head.  
He moved without thought, without care.  
If no one told him to stop and swap and rest he would walk himself straight into the ground.  
The world tilted on its axis when he stopped, chest rattling with every breath, sweat running down the backs of his legs.  
Charles was half sure he steamed in the cold.  
“Here.”  
A flask of water was pressed into his hand and he hungrily gulped down half its contents, before sparing a glance to the man it belonged to.  
James.  
His knight in shining armour.

“Thank you,” he managed after a short break to breathe.  
“Captains say we are to rest for an hour or so, then continue on to the ridge” – James pointed with a long arm over to a ridge a few miles off to the south – “where we will camp.”  
“Reckon that’ll take us another three hours to reach, if we make good time.”  
“Probably.”  
James squeezed Charles’ shoulder and Charles handed him the half empty flask back.  
“We’ll sleep like the dead tonight.”

At that James laughed, eyes crinkling handsomely, mustache twitching.  
Charles grinned, balling his hands into fists to fight the urge to grab him by the lapels and kiss him in plain view of the whole crew.  
“We will sleep, Charles, and we will wake again, and we will get home.”  
Charles looked at their dusty, worn boots standing there in the shale, like images cut out and put there by force.  
“Home, huh.”  
James squeezed his shoulder again, put some kind of meaning into his gaze that Charles felt too muddled to parse through.  
“Home, Charles.”

He inevitably thought of James’ drawing room, the cigars they had smoked there, socked feet by the grate and braces slipped off their shoulders.  
The feather bed upstairs, sunlight streaming over James’ sleeping face, Charles watching him for an hour or more, before James woke with his nose all scrunched up.  
No thought spared for his own rooms.  
“Home sounds agreeable.”  
Another squeeze again and James took his leave.  
Hickey looked at Charles with two raised brows and Charles ignored him.

He felt tethered again.  
No need to usurp the Captain and his men, when Charles again felt confident in their ability to lead them home.  
James had made it there, to civilisation, or what passed for it up here, and then back.  
They could and would too.  
The boat-sledge held him up as he leaned against it, and closed his eyes.  
An hour later they walked again.

With a goal now Charles kept an eye on it, marking their progress on the mental map he’d been constructing to the best of his ability.  
He was good at orienteering, always had been.  
Would love to orienteer the plain of James’ chest again.  
With mouth or hands, he wasn’t picky there.  
Only wanted to taste him, feel him. The heat of his skin, the beat of his heart in the palm of Charles’ hand.  
It would have to wait, of course, until they were save and warm and washed and still with all parts accounted for and functional, but Charles yearned.

That evening in camp he could barely tear his eyes off of James, dinner a secondary interest to the feast his eyes had.  
Like a magnet Charles followed James when he stood from his seat and walked betweeen the rows of tents.  
James ducked under the canvas of his own tent and Charles followed, closed the flaps behind himself.  
Cleared his throat.  
“Charles, you spooked me,” said James quietly, unbuttoning his coat.  
Charles silently stepped towards him and finished the job for him.  
Dropped the coat on the ground and started on the jacket, the waistcoat, the shirt.  
James let him, hands stroking up and down Charles’ arms.  
With a little sigh Charles finally got the last layer off of James’ torso and leaned forward.  
Rested his forehead on the skin of his chest.  
He had lost weight, as they all had.  
But the length of his arms, the shape of the bone below, that was all familiar. The pull of muscle as James now lifted his arms and hugged Charles close to his chest.  
Kissed the top of his filthy head.

“Freddie, my dear, are you alright?”  
Charles shivered. Whimpered. Wrapped his arms around James’ hips and kissed him below the left collarbone.  
James' hands on his back were warm and heavy, a welcome, comfortable weight.  
He needed them on his skin.  
Violently he tore himself away from James, and started tearing his clothes off his body.  
“Freddie! Lord, what’s gotten into you?”  
“I-I need-!”  
Charles tossed his undershirt away as if it had personally offended him and crashed back into James.  
Their skin was clammy with cold sweat, rubbed against each other with grit and Charles sobbed for the base comfort of it all.  
“Oh Freddie dear, it’s fine, it’s all fine.”

Gently James lifted Charles into his arms and Charles hugged tightly around his neck, sobbed into the overgrown hair above James’ ear.  
With a grunt James lowered them both on his cot, the furs soft against Charles’ naked back.  
“Careful, my dear boy, mind the canvas, it’s cold.”  
James let go of Charles to discard both their boots and then stepped out of his trousers, leaving only his long pants.  
Charles kicked his own trousers off and reached desperately for James, tears clouding his vision.

James came easily; gathered the furs around them and just moments later the combined warmth of their skin started to thaw Charles from the outside in.

Charles cried until he was too exhausted to even keep his hold on James’ arms, until he was lost in the press of James’ skin against his own.  
Then he fell asleep and – for the first time in months – did not dream at all.


End file.
